In a photolithography process in manufacturing, for example, a semiconductor device, for example, a resist coating treatment for applying a resist solution onto a wafer to form a resist film, exposure processing for exposing the resist film into a predetermined pattern, heating processing for accelerating the chemical reaction in the resist film after exposure (post-exposure baking), and developing treatment for developing the exposed resist film are performed in sequence to form a predetermined resist pattern on the wafer.
For example, the heating processing such as the above-described post-exposure baking is usually performed in a heating processing apparatus. The heating processing apparatus includes a thermal plate for mounting and heating the wafer thereon. The thermal plate has a heater embedded therein which generates heat by power feeding, and the heat generation by the heater adjusts the thermal plate to a desired temperature.
The thermal processing temperature in the above-described heating processing greatly affects the line width of the resist pattern to be finally formed on the wafer. Hence, to strictly control the temperature within the wafer during heating, the thermal plate of the above-described heating processing apparatus is divided into a plurality of regions, and an independent heater is embedded in each of the regions to adjust the temperature for each of the regions.
However, if the temperature adjustment for all of the regions of the above-described thermal plate is performed at the same set temperature, the temperature may vary within the wafer on the thermal plate, for example, due to the difference in thermal resistance between the regions. For this reason, the set temperatures for the regions of the thermal plate are subjected to temperature correction (temperature offset), and the temperature correction values for the regions are set to make the temperature uniform within the wafer (see Patent Document 1).
[Patent Document]
Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2001-143850